Then and Now
by Echos in my head
Summary: Clove doesn't die right away after Thresh hits her with a rock. She still has time to think everything over. Contains very minor violent imagery.


Then and Now

For one reason or another, it didn't hurt. Clove saw the giant from Eleven raise the rock. She felt the fear envelope her, followed the horrible realisation that she was about to die. She saw the rock swoop down, and heard the sound of the impact, a terrible _crunch._ But it didn't hurt, and she felt several times better as she fell to the ground. Relieved. Before it happened, she thought she'd die slowly and painfully. At least now she knew it wouldn't be painful.

She was floating in a state of semi-consciousness, barely aware of her surroundings and yet completely aware of them at the same time. Her eyes were closed, and she couldn't move, but she could still hear. She could still feel a little. Her brain was damaged, but it wasn't gone yet.

Grass with sharp blades like the knives she enjoyed throwing poked her in the face while she heard Eleven and Twelve talking to each other. Eleven was saying something about not owing anything anymore. Clove supposed that he was letting Fire Girl leave unscratched because of Rue. Well, she wouldn't get away completely unscratched, Clove had made sure of that. If that cut she made on her forehead didn't kill her from blood loss, then Clove would die in disgrace. As she heard them both, Eleven and Twelve, run away, Clove wished that she could break out of her half-dead state and finish the job Cato had allowed her to have. She wished that she could slit open Katniss Everdeen until she looked like a pile of bloody spaghetti. Instead, she would lay next to the Cornucopia and die.

"Clove!" It was Cato. Clove knew that Cato had seen the whole thing. The worst part of it all was that he had seen her fail, seen her brought down by one of the lower district tributes. That was just embarrassing. To die like this was shameful in her district.

She had wanted to win. She had wanted to win so badly for her family to be proud of her, and her district too. To be in the Games was a District Two child's dream. But here she was, struck down by a farming boy. Cato saw it, her family saw it, her district saw it. Clove suddenly wished that she would hurry up and die.

"Clove?" Cato was closer now. She dimly felt her hand getting crushed by another, and someone shaking her shoulder. "Come on, Clove, don't leave me now." Cato sounded almost frantic, but Clove knew it wasn't out of concern for her. Career tributes didn't really care for each other. Cato only worried about Cato. Without her, District Twelve was the only remaining district with two tributes left, unless Loverboy died before the medicine got to him.

"Clove, wake up. This isn't funny." He sounded scared, Clove thought with amusement. The great and brutal Cato, frightened. In truth, it would have been great if she had made it away alive. In that case, she would have killed the Girl on Fire, and Cato would have been the main cause of death of Loverboy. A win-win situation. All they would have to do next is kill the other two. She would take Five and he would definitely kill Eleven. Then the Games would be theirs. A double victory to District Two. Clove imagined her family's pride and the riches provided by the Capitol.

"Clove?" He was starting to fade, and it was about time, too. All at once, Clove hoped that Cato would lose. If Cato won, he'd make sure that her failure would be publicised in her district. She would be the loser from Two. Eleven couldn't win either, and neither could either one from Twelve. That left Five as the best winner for the Hunger Games. Clove's dying wish was that the redheaded girl from District Five would win the Games. At least she wouldn't talk badly about her when she won. At least, she didn't think that she would.

"Clove, stay with me..."

As everything started to turn into oblivion, Clove wondered what life would have been like if she could have done a little more cooking. Almost every moment of her life, she had been trained for the Hunger Games. She threw knives and never missed her target. She was a deadeye. Invincible with a knife in her hand. But there was one time, so long ago, when she had wandered into the kitchen and looked at all of the food. At that moment, she had thought about everything she had ever eaten, and compared it to the raw ingredients in front of her. It astounded her that so many different things could be made from so little simple things.

She had never cooked anything in her life, but she had always wanted to try. But instead of using her knife to cut fruits and vegetables, she used them to cut practice dummies and human flesh. It was a shame.

She couldn't feel Cato's hand anymore. She couldn't feel the grass on her cheek. She couldn't hear her district partner's pleas. Everything turned into nothing, and Clove was sucked into the darkness.

Her brain switched off. Her lungs stopped working, her blood flow halted, and her muscles went utterly limp.

"Clove? _Clove!_"

The cannon fired.

* * *

_Author's Note: I've always liked Clove, for some reason. She was my favorite Career tribute in the books, so I decided to write a little story about her.  
_


End file.
